Gautam Ghosh's blog on how social media and technology and online communities are impacting organizations, people, careers and learning. Some focus on Social Recruiting, Social HR, Social Learning and Social Recognition.

Jul 11, 2008

HR consultants in Top 25 Consultants

Cheese spends most of his time trying to convince clients that talent management, and the HR function in general, needs to be more of a strategic player.

"This whole debate needs to be put on strategic footing. We haven't invested nearly enough in HR," Cheese says. "The nature of the debate has become so much more strategic, and that's really the basis of how we've built the human performance practice at Accenture. This is a top issue for clients, and they still need a lot of help in this area."

"It's a fascinating time. We have a social revolution going on in terms of how people collaborate, communicate, connect and share knowledge," Cheese says. "And it's not only happening in broader society, it's happening in the corporate world." It also presents the opportunity to see how companies are going to adapt and apply new thinking to some pretty old theories of management practice.

For sure, some companies have had trouble adjusting, like the one that decided to ban Facebook for all of its employees. "Is that your long-term strategy?" Cheese says he asked the company's leadership. "Because it can't be. That's got to be a short-term reaction to something you don't understand. New and emerging technologies, such as collaboration tools, wikis and social networking sites, will revolutionize how we work, how we learn and how we connect."

His human capital practice team's turnover has consistently been below 10 percent, and he has taken revenues from $120 million to nearly $600 million since he accepted the position in 2003.

That message incorporates Deloitte's philosophy of building human resource capabilities from within, as opposed to outsourcing them, as well as bringing all parts of the C-suite together—not just the HR department—to solve human capital challenges.